Xbox 360 Review: Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands

2008’s Prince is nothing more than a distant memory now…

Visiting his brother’s kingdom following his adventure in Azad, the Prince finds the royal palace under siege from a mighty army bent on its destruction. Deciding to use the ancient power of the Sand in a desperate gamble to save the kingdom from total annihilation, the Prince will embark on an epic adventure in which he will learn to bear the mantle of true leadership, and that great power often comes with a great cost.

The 2008 Prince of Persia game was met with some incredibly mixed opinions. Some liked the simplicity, look and easy nature of the game…while others felt that the Prince had an identity crisis and had forgotten his roots. I personally quite enjoyed the game and am still rather annoyed that we never got a real ending to that game after Ahriman escaped again, hopefully one day…

The Forgotten Sands returns the Prince to familiar territory with rewinding time, the traditional jumping and wall-running, while combat feels like a button masher…or you can get through the game by doing that, anyway. The game does limit how many times you can rewind though, but if you die then you’ll just go back to a checkpoint as you would expect. On the whole, The Forgotten Sands is a pretty easy game and a short one at that.

The Prince is his usual cocky and smug self. He also looks like his old self, instead of the way he did in the 2008 game. The plot does enough to keep you going through the game, but it’s hardly groundbreaking. Control-wise, the game is simple and easy to get to grips with…veterans of the series will feel right at home as you do the usual things that you have come to love about the franchise.

There are a few difficult moments where the Prince can freeze water to use as a pillar for a short time, as well as appearing platforms that only appear one at a time. Towards the end of the game, you need superb control over the Prince to guarantee victory. It’s challenging, but rewarding at the same time. Boss fights are sadly, forgettable and whoever decided to put an achievement for not getting hit once by certain bosses needs shot.

Visually, The Forgotten Sands is a mixed bag as well. Levels look decent and the Prince is detailed, but the enemy characters look too similar, there isn’t much variety in character design. Voice-acting is pretty good and the music sets the mood just right.

The Verdict

It’s obvious that they made The Forgotten Sands to tie in with the Prince of Persia film, but what I don’t get is why they didn’t just remake the original Sands of Time, as that was the best in the series and some HD visuals and better graphics could have been all we needed. Instead, we get a game that doesn’t have anything to do with the film…nor does it push the series forward, it just goes back to its roots. It’s not a bad game by any means; it just doesn’t innovate enough for my liking.